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Athletes vent on Twitter, and leave it behind, after Obama re-election

If you're at all active on social media these days, you know that it's been a minefield of half-cooked, rage-fueled political opinion. And with the election now over, it's taken a new turn: either in-your-face gloating victory dances or "nice going, America, our country is doomed" sour-grapes responses.

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Our athletes had many of the same reactions you did, none more extreme than ex-Dodgers reliever Todd Coffey. So infuriated was he with the results of the election that he went on a rant, cursing out followers and finally pulling the plug on his Twitter account altogether. It's only visible now in retweets, as you can see at right.

And sometimes these things break exactly like you think they would. Plenty of professional golfers and NASCAR drivers weren't exactly thrilled with the decision either:

"I did my best to fight for an America that I believe in. Wasn't meant to be. Hopefully the next 4 years Americans can find a job." -Paul Azinger, @PaulAzinger

"Sad day. I hope I don't get sick or need surgery or a job or a loan before I learn to speak Chinese and get on food stamps." -Chris Smith, @thesmitty15

"Well, gonna have to shut down one business and not going to open two others that were planned. Guess I better keep racing" -Brendan Gaughan, @Brendan62

"Looks like 4 more years of going backwards. #scary" -Martin Truex Jr., @MartinTruexJr56

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But it wasn't all doom and gloom in the world of pro athletes. For instance, the Miami Heat's Dwyane Wade tweeted out old pictures of himself with President Obama, along with this message: "Told the prez We got em ...the people's president ... Barack."

"Looks as if we have our President! Any chance we could now join hands & try 2 grow as a country or will we cont 2 b divided by parties?" -Kurt Warner, @kurt13warner

"So it looks like Obama won. While he's better than Mittens, he still has a lot of work to do (Internet freedom, human rights, drones, etc)." -Chris Kluwe, @ChrisWarcraft

This one demands to be read in the voice of its writer, one Dick Vitale (@DickieV):